Antonymes - There Can Be No True Beauty Without DecayA new release from the Hibernate label. This album mixes together, in an anonymous manner, 7 minimal, largely piano-based pieces, with remixes from Ian Hawgood, Isnaj Dui, Offthesky, Field Rotation, Wil Bolton, Spheruleus and James Banbury. There is no attribution for each of the remixes, so part of the fun of listening to this is trying to discern who is doing what and how they have manipulated the original source material.

This is a beauty in many respects. The packaging is lovely and many of the core tracks are so emotionally moving that they force me to stop what I'm doing and listen with awe. Check this out if you're a fan of "modern classical" and its interface with ambient and experimental minimalism.

A very special recording.....new to me though released in 1989 on New Albion Records. Trompone, Accordion, Voice, Garden hose & Conch shell to name some of the instruments performed improv in a unique drone space.

From the Liner notes......

"A warden approached us as we prepared to descend 14 feet down into the 186 foot diameter cistern that once held 2 million gallons of water. The warden reproached us for parking a van on the dirt covered ceiling. Pot holes suggested that perhaps the ceiling was not so stable. Once we had made our decent and after my eyes had adjusted to the dim cavern, I realized almost at once that the warden had probably never been inside: the cavernous cylinder is made of reenforced concrete with more pillars per square yard than a skyscraper. The water tank, built in 1970 on an army base, was probably designed to withstand heavy bombing. Our van was the equivalent of a mosquito on a housetop.

The remarkable thing about the acoustic space is the long reverb, which could approach 45 seconds, and the lack of slap echoes and distinct early reflections that are often characteristic of large cathedrals; only pure, smooth reverb, the type that can be simulated electronically but is thought to be unrealistic and fantastical.

The space is real, and unique. A large cathedral will return slap echoes and uneven resonance characteristics. The cistern showed a very smooth frequency response and no echoes, only a smooth reverberation, the amplitude of which appears to begin at the same decibel level as the source. Consequently, it is impossible to tell where the performer stops and the reverberation takes over. One additional aspect of the reverberation field that does not seem to record easily and which makes simulation very difficult, is that it slowly moved from the sound source along the walls until it enveloped the listener: a most remarkable and beautiful phenomena."

The Humble Bee - HenriettaA new vinyl (and digital) release by Craig Tattersall. This is pretty neat stuff. From what I can gather, Tattersall took a brief vacation in Cornwall in 2011 and mapped features of the landscape to musical notes, creating some interesting piano rolls for a music box and other stringed instruments. (The picture below probably conveys the idea better than I can with words.) Anyhow, the album is pretty interesting: a mixture of Cornwall field recordings, tape loops, "dusting," electronics, and this other crazy "nature's music box" stuff.

Andrew Bird - The Quietest Show on Earth - I've been in an Andrew Bird mood for the past week or two & was happy to discover this download of a small live show in the Mojave Desert. You can find it here... http://www.quietestshowonearth.com/

Moritz von Oswald & Nils Petter Molvaer - 1/1 - This one is fantastic. Dubby electronics with Molvaer's trumpet over the top. I'm not sure when it will be available on the US but I didn't want to wait so I broke down & bought it on ebay for $30.

tonefloat-ikon - streams of consciousness 132406 - Got this at Bandcamp thanks to an earlier post here. Very nice.

Moritz von Oswald & Nils Petter Molvaer - 1/1 - This one is fantastic. Dubby electronics with Molvaer's trumpet over the top. I'm not sure when it will be available on the US but I didn't want to wait so I broke down & bought it on ebay for $30.

I looked up some youtube samples of this after reading your description. Sounds awesome!

Orla Wren - Book of the Folded ForestIncredible. This also includes occasional vocals, but is largely a curious combination of glitchy manipulations and modern composition. I bought a digital copy, but there is a (somewhat pricey) physical copy that comes with a DVD that includes videos for selected tracks. I might break down and buy it too simply because this is Quality Stuff. Facture is releasing a new Orla Wren album in early December that contains reworkings of tracks from these sessions.Samples/Buy: https://homenormal.bandcamp.com/album/book-of-the-folded-forest